Hyderabad: Aruvela Shravan Kumar of the iNews portal, Accused No. 6 in the unauthorised phone-tapping case during the BRS government tenure, returned to the city and was questioned for six hours by investigation officer N. Venkatagiri and senior officials of the special investigation team (SIT) probing the matter at the Jubilee Hills ACP office, here on Saturday.Wanted for 12 months, Kumar, for whom a red corner notice had been issued, landed at RGIA in the early hours of Saturday and appeared before the police. He had reportedly fled to the US.On being asked, the ACP refused to disclose whether Kumar was deported or had returned on his own, stating that revealing the information could be in violation of Supreme Court orders. The Supreme Court, on Kumar’s special leave petition, granted him interim relief, ordering that no harsh actions be taken against him. The next hearing is on April 28.Sources said the investigators wanted to know under whose instructions Kumar had purchased phone-tapping equipment and who were instrumental in establishing secret war rooms in Rajanna Sircilla, Mahbubnagar and Warangal districts.Shravan Kumar was questioned on whose orders he had installed illegal phone tapping devices and servers and a war room at his then iNews office in Road No. 11, Banjara Hills.Kumar was also asked to name the senior politician who was his close contact during the BRS tenure, and about the political leaders and police officials who frequented the war room at his office. The officials wanted to know how many phones were tapped and with whom he was sharing information and who had advised him to flee from India on March 13 last year.Sources also said that Kumar was questioned about police officials who operated the war room in his absence and who had sponsored his trip to the US and other countries. His statements were video recorded and also typed by a SIT writer, sources said.A senior SIT officer, who is part of the probe team, said, “CBI acted as a nodal agency that coordinated with Interpol. The circumstances and situations were so made that Kumar was compelled to out from his hideout in the US and appear before SIT.”Kumar reportedly disclosed that it was on instructions from former SIB chief T. Prabhakar Rao and a senior politician that he had fled India.“No doubt it took time but we took it as a challenge and legally trapped him. We forced him to come out of his hideout to face prosecution,” a SIT officer disclosed.Meanwhile, reliable police sources told Deccan Chronicle that efforts were being intensified to get Prabhakar Rao provisionally arrested in the United States and deported to India.
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